


Operation Groundlock

by CelesteArius



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie) Spoilers, Beautiful Cinnamon Roll Too Good For This World, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Friendship, Nightmares, Past Character Death, Teambuilding, Vision draws, Vision is a cutey, a little angsty, alternate endings, but not really, i may have lied about the angst, the new avengers team, too pure, yeah there's angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-14
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-30 11:17:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 18,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3934813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CelesteArius/pseuds/CelesteArius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wanda Maximoff is the only new Avenger who can't fly. In an attempt to help them build themselves as a team, Steve orders Operation Groundlock - a month of no flying, even outside of training, to ease the tension between Wanda and the rest. After training together to become Avengers, the teams interactions form friendships that make them a family, and in one case, something more.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Out of all the Avengers that had been recruited after the incident with Ultron, Wanda Maximoff, The Scarlet Witch, was the only one that couldn’t fly. Her new teammates and Steve Rogers knew this very well, and since training began, they had formulated attack strategies based around this fact.

She had never had anyone she ever knew be able to fly, and now, on a team of four, she was surrounded by three of them. There was Sam Wilson, Falcon, and flying was in his name. He was trained by the military for aerial combat, and he used specially designed wings to fly about. There was James Rhodes, the War Machine, who has another one of Stark’s suits with a gun on the shoulder. He was an aircraft pilot and studied aviation engineering. It was normal for him to be in the air. That was where he belonged. And then there was Vision, who could fly easier than the rest of them. He didn’t need any external assistance to propel himself into the air, as graceful as a bird. If anyone truly deserved to fly it would be Vision.

For Wanda, it had never been a matter of what Vision was to her. She still heard Steve refer to him as an ‘it’, and he and Tony Stark had agreed that, because he was an ‘it’, Vision’s act of being able to wield Mjolnir was void and didn’t prove him worthy. That wasn’t how she saw it at all. Vision was just as much a man as James Rhodes or Sam Wilson.

She had seen in his mind only once before, when he wasn’t who he is now. When he was still inside the Cradle and dreaming. His dreams had been nightmares then. Nightmares of ash, blood, destruction and death. His mind was filled only with the aspirations of who she later realized to be a madman, a murderer, with nothing else to fill his unconscious. Now she doubted that this was true. He was on the side of life, as he had said, and through the few weeks she had been training with him, she saw he was more curious than anything else. He watched and thought more than anyone she had ever met. In the fleeting glances she had into his mind now she saw a very different picture. Vision’s mind was as peaceful as the sky and of soft streams of water. Unlike Ultron, whose mind was sharp and painful, Vision’s mind was soft and a solace.

It was really no wonder he could fly. He was naïve and innocent and young, so out of place in a world where everyone else was hardened by their experiences, some withered away more than others. If Wanda believed in angels, she would think he was one, and that Ultron had forgotten to make his wings.

Wanda tried not to feel jealous of her teammates and their ability to fly. It was kind of hard to when they were faced with obstacle courses with walls she had no hope of climbing on her own. Vision would always come back for her, cradling her like he did in Sokovia until they touched down on the other side, and then they would both rush to catch up to Falcon and War Machine. On the days Wanda demanded him to let her try on her own, he’d finish the course first, instead of the normal third.

Steve and Natasha noticed this rift in relations between the new Avengers. Wilson and Rhodes – Rhodey, he had introduced himself as – tended to form their own group, and Vision stayed with Wanda. Wanda knew it was because he thought she felt out of place, and it was true. She did feel out of place. No longer did she have the familiarity of Sokovia or her brother at her side. His death still tore at her soul, leaving it vulnerable and damaged, but any attempt at reconciliation by anyone made her hiss like a cornered snake.

Whether either Steve or Natasha were going to do anything about this rift remained to be seen, but they had called a little meeting to talk about teamwork. Captain Rogers told them the only reason the Avengers team was so effective was because they learned each other’s strengths and weaknesses, worked around those, and formed plans based around their teammate’s abilities. They got along because they related to each other through humor and memories. And that was what the Captain and the Widow suggested for them. Develop a movie night, game night, whatever. Just get to know each other and get along.

So Rhodey decided they had to watch Disney movies. Wilson decided to pick the movie _Pinocchio_ , if only for the irony. Wanda felt it was a personal insult to Vision, but Vision didn’t seem to mind. He sat on the couch beside her, knees drawn to his chest, watching the movie with just as much interest as a child would. Rhodey and Wilson laughed, Wanda mainly let her mind brush Vision’s and Vision watched the movie silently. It wasn’t really much of a bonding experience.

So Steve proposed something to Natasha. He called it Operation Groundlock.

 

It was really quite simple despite its name. It was a study in teambuilding, really. A month where Wilson, Rhodey and Vision would be locked to the ground, to walk wherever they went, even outside of training. If they saw how hard it was for Wanda to keep up with them, maybe they would work a little harder to help her keep up.

Natasha didn’t know whether it would do any good to ease the tension between Rhodey, Sam and Wanda, because Vision got along with everyone. Rhodey and Sam liked him well enough to laugh easily in his presence, and they trusted him to have their backs in training exercises, and despite his strength, he would never be too hard on any of them. That was the thing about Vision. Despite his intelligence and appearance, he was like a child in the fact that he had no qualms with anyone. He forgave easily, and didn’t hold vendettas.

Despite their typical 0600 rise-and-shine call, Steve pulled the alarm in the middle of the night, the clock just hitting 3am before he roused the troops. He had told them to never expect a routine schedule (crime didn’t have one either) but had never held to his warning. Now he goes and rounds them the old fashioned way, in full uniform, pounding against his shield with his fist. Vision, who doesn’t sleep anyway, was waiting for him.

“Is there a reason you are waking them early?” he asks as Steve passes.

“Make sure they get up and are ready in five minutes,” he responds, not answering his question. He’d rather not repeat himself. “Meet me outside the compound in ten. And no flying.” Vision looked confused, but said nothing as Steve disappeared down the hall.

When the four of them met him and Natasha outside, bleary-eyed and curious as to their rude awakening, he told them of his Groundlock. “For the next week, flying of any kind will be forbidden, not just in training,” Steve said, ignoring Sam’s beginning protest. “Consider it a teambuilding exercise. It’ll help you all see from Wanda’s point of view. So first thing’s first. Three miles, around the compound. Head out!”

So, three miles wasn’t horrible. It wasn’t anything like the ten miles they’d had to run, in the rain, just a week ago. Sam and Rhodey both had military endurance, and Vision was an android, so the only person who really had trouble with cardio was Wanda. Sam and Rhodey lapped her with cheeky “On your left”s, while Vision didn’t say anything as he passed her. He did run an extra mile to finish with her, and for that companionship she was grateful. She didn’t know why Steve made him run anyway. Vision was physical perfection, and he had no more muscle strength to build, so all this running wasn’t going to benefit him.

By the time they finished, she was soaked with sweat and wanted, more than anything else, to take a shower. It was just nearing 4:30, and she wasn’t in the mood to sleep anymore. She had too many nightmares as it was, partially because, without Pietro, her mind wandered, and she found herself in dreams of her brother’s death. Of the moment she lost contact with his mind, the other side of their connection as empty as space. Clint Barton had tried to apologize to her, but had stopped just before saying the words. He felt it would dig into the wound and make it deeper, throwing salt into the still-bleeding gash on her soul. Wanda could feel his guilt, his shared grief, but she didn’t know if he could forgive him for what happened. On one hand, she understood why Pietro would do it. Clint had a wife and three children now, and she didn’t know whether to feel honored or offended that the child’s middle name was Pietro.

So she showered, taking her time and not minding the cold water. It was a relief against her flushed skin, and relaxed her more than hot water ever would. Closing her eyes and resting her forehead on the cool tile, her powers instantly sought out her solace, the soft mind that belonged to someone infinitely powerful and only a month old.

Vision was quiet. He watched and learned, and he was constantly thinking. Currently he was thinking of Clint’s children. He hadn’t necessarily met them, only saw them once when Laura brought them to visit Clint in the infirmary after the battle in Sokovia. Vision was more than hesitant to meet them, and merely watched the children from afar. He was reflecting on their fragility, as well as their innocence and naiveté, which so closely resembled his own. Ultron had thought his naïve as well, which he had directly agreed to. It was easy to get lost in his mind, so calm and vast, intelligent and new.

So Operation Groundlock, as Steve called it, was underway. A whole month with Rhodey stripped of his armor, Sam stripped of his wings and Vision keeping his feet planted firmly on the ground. A whole month of them training just like that. It made sense to Wanda, moving past the teambuilding aspect. You never know when Sam or Rhodey wouldn’t have their suit or wings. It was definitely a good idea to get them accustomed to being able to rely on their own bodies and have them be just as strong as their own suits. Vision, however, even if he wasn’t able to fly, had his strength and mind to back him up. And that weird intangibility thing he did sometimes. Wanda still didn’t know how he did that, but would bet it was because of the Gem imbedded into his forehead.

Wanda opened her eyes and watched the water disappear down the drain before sighing and shutting the shower off. It was probably time for her to get out. Her fingers were beginning to prune.

After she got dressed, not bothering to dry her hair, knowing full well that it would turn into a chaotic mess of curls later on, she headed to get breakfast. It was just now reaching 5:30, and both Rhodey and Wilson had returned to bed after they finished their run, so the kitchen was vacant. She was partially grateful, but at the same time, she wouldn’t allow herself to feel a little lonely. She decided to preoccupy herself with breakfast. Part of her wanted to have some cereal, but she despised how soggy it could become in such a short amount of time. Another part of her wanted to make herself some fried eggs and cheese on some buttered bread. Just the thought of it made her hungry, like the thought of cereal did not, so she dug through the fridge in search of the components to her meal.

It was while she was leaning against the counter and eating cheesy, butter eggs on a warm biscuit did someone join her. It was Vision, coming into the kitchen just as silently as if he were floating, but a quick glance at his feet proved that wasn’t true.

“Good morning, Wanda,” he said, as if he hadn’t said it almost three hours ago. Granted, then, she hadn’t acknowledged or responded, so it didn’t really seem like much of a good morning.

“Good morning, Vision,” she responded in kind, brushing his mind briefly. He was concerned for her, per usual, and was genuinely pleased to see her eating. (After she first arrived, her brother’s death still hanging heavily around her, she went several days without eating, and only Vision’s constant insistence made her ingest anything. She realized she should probably thank him for that, but there never seemed to be a good time.) “What do you think of Captain Rogers’ new team building strategy?”

“I do not know,” Vision answered honestly. “Granted, running is something the Captain has us do anyway, and it was completed without too much difficulty. We’ll have to see how the rest of the day, or week, goes before we can draw any conclusions. It may be incredibly beneficial for Colonel Rhodes and Mr. Wilson. I feel they rely on their suits too much sometimes.”

Wanda huffed a laugh around her breakfast. That was exactly how she saw it as well. “I don’t think that rule should apply to you though,” she said honestly. “You know not to rely on flying all the time. You’re strong enough without that. I think it’s more… let-everyone-know-what-its-like-from-my-perspective so you all know to pity me a bit less and help me out a bit more.”

“I don’t pity you,” Vision countered to her statement. “Every Avenger is strong in their own way. Steve Rogers can’t fly and he is the captain of the Avengers. Neither can Natasha Romanov, Bruce Banner or Clint Barton.” She tried not to wince at his name. “And yet, they are all powerful in their own areas and are vital parts of the Avengers team. You are strong, Ms. Maximoff. Stronger than you yourself possibly realize. You’re a vital part of this team and, in a battle, we could be overwhelmed without you.”

Wanda smiled at his words. He wasn’t saying purely to make her feel better. Vision was like a child in the fact that he was honest in the things he said and did. He meant what he said, and knowing that he valued her in such a way made her feel a bit better.

“Thank you, Vision,” she said, and found she really meant it. “And… thank you, for being on my side, even when I wasn’t.”

The android smiled back at her, and his smile was the most gentle, soft thing she had ever seen, a perfect copy of his mind. “You are welcome, Ms. Maximoff.”

“You can call me Wanda, Vision. Everyone else does.”

“Then you’re welcome, Wanda.”


	2. Chapter 2

The rest of the day passed by rather uneventfully. Wanda went to the training room and practiced on the punching bag. Natasha had told her that her punch was terrible, that she was losing power in the swing by pushing her arm straight out. _“Add a bit of twist in your arm,”_ she had told her while demonstrating. _“It gives you more power. And you could break your knuckles if you’re not too careful.”_ So here she was, trying to build muscle memory enough to have it be an automatic action.

Natasha was ‘in charge’ of training them in hand-to-hand combat. Her assassin past was a sensitive topic, and her situation with Bruce Banner certainly didn’t help. Her training sessions were going terribly. Wanda had always relied on her powers and mind tricks, never pure physical force for fighting. That was her brother’s area of expertise. He was the fast and strong one. Wanda had no idea how all the others were doing. Sam and Rhodey had military training, so she had no doubt they were up to Natasha’s standards. Vision, however, definitely had the strength, but he probably lacked finesse and tactic.

So after finishing her training session with Natasha, with more humiliating attempts at trying to subdue her, Steve gathered them all outside for another knock at the obstacle course. Their goal was to complete it in under a certain amount of time (which Steve wouldn’t tell them), and so far, they hadn’t done it. Calling it an obstacle course gave it a bit of a childlike quality. It wasn’t childlike at all. There was machine gun fire and barbed-wire electrified fences, apex ladders and wall vaults, dodging panels and balancing bridge (which wouldn’t be too bad if it wasn’t moving), rope climbing and crawling through mud underneath electric wire. It went without saying that, whatever goal Steve was looking for wasn’t going to happen any time soon.

So now they were all resigned to do this course again, and again, and again until they reached whatever goal Steve had set for them. It was really rather pathetic, that they, two of which were military trained and two who had fought against Ultron’s army, couldn’t make it past some ridiculous course. It had rained the past few days, and still was when they made their way to the course. They ended up covered in ridiculous amounts of mud, which Wanda, Sam and Rhodey found hilarious. Well, they found Vision’s purple skin covered in abnormal amounts of thick, dark mud from the course. Even the rain and the cold didn’t damper on the humor they found in it.

One look at the four of them had Steve shaking his head, telling them that they still hadn’t made the time, and brought out hoses to clean themselves off with. This resulted in Sam and Rhodey chasing each other with the hose while Wanda and Vision waited impatiently for them to stop being childish.

It was a good day, in the grand scheme of things. Wanda felt more at ease than she ever had before, and had finished the course before Rhodey for the first time since they began their training. She’d almost been able to trap Natasha’s hands behind her, her wrists pinned between her shoulder blades, but the assassin’s dexterity overwhelmed her. Nevertheless, while she was lying flat on her back, and Natasha offered her a hand, she complimented her for her effort, and told her she was nearly there.

Operation Groundlock wasn’t helping in their teambuilding as much as Steve probably would have hoped, but Wanda had to admit, it was funny when, in their practice battles, she got to watch as Sam and Rhodey faced off against Steve and Natasha and did worse than she had ever seen. Steve and Natasha overwhelmed them. Wanda and Vision, even unable to fly, were able to hold their own for the three rounds they practiced for. Vision even managed to use the Captain’s shield against him and knock him flat on his back.

A week after Steve started the Groundlock, Wanda couldn’t sleep. Her powers drifted to Natasha, images of blood and ballerinas, hooded men and gunshots. She was only able to sleep for about an hour before she woke in a cold sweat. Any attempt at going back to sleep would lead right back to that dream that she had no desire to see, and she was now wired and on edge, so she couldn’t anyway. Cringing at the cold floor, Wanda wrapped her blanket around herself before glancing at the clock. It was just past midnight. Maybe if she wandered around for a while, she could calm herself down enough to sleep.

Most nights she wondered if she was just living part of a nightmare. Her brother was gone, dead saving another man who was alive somewhere, probably home with his family. Her brother was the last piece of her family. He had been there while they kid underneath the bed, feet away from a bomb they didn’t know wouldn’t explode. He’d been there, just on the other side of the wall, while they were the subject of experimentation. He’d been there when they joined HYDRA, and eventually Ultron, against the Avengers, and then with the Avengers against Ultron. All throughout Wanda’s life, he’d been there. And now he wasn’t, and she was a part of something that was hard, trying and so new and terrifying. He wasn’t there, and she couldn’t help but feel like it was her fault. If she hadn’t told him to go, if he had stayed and helped her defend the device, he wouldn’t be dead. He wouldn’t be gone.

Eventually, she found herself in the lounge. The lounge was a nice place to be at night. It was right at the edge of the facility, and two of the walls were nothing but windows. If she sat on one of the couches she could look right out and see the woods and the stars. New York City was loud and it had too many lights, so no one was able to see the stars past the illuminated buildings and neon signs. Occasionally, she would see a shooting star, but she would never wish for anything. She didn’t believe in wishes, but she supposed that others who were less experienced in the unfairness and trails of the world wouldn’t understand that they were useless. Their naïve little dreams and fantasies refreshed her just a little bit, she who had lost her parents, her home and her brother, and now seemed to have lost her purpose.

Her train of thought was interrupted suddenly. “Wanda?” a soft voice came from behind her, and she turned to see Vision coming in to the lounge. “What are you doing awake at this hour?” He seemed genuinely concerned for her wellbeing. Vision already knew that she had nightmares as a result of her powers and her lost connection with her brother’s mind, her constant rock in a tumbling world. Vision approached her slowly, in a delicate way that offended her. Was he afraid she would lash out at him like a wild animal? A brush against his mind corrected that thought and eased the sting of offense. He wasn’t apprehensive of her, he was merely afraid to intrude on her privacy.

“I just couldn’t sleep,” she said lightly. Vision didn’t seem to believe her, but said nothing and sat in the chair adjacent to the couch. He drew his knees up to his chest, a position that reminded her of a child. Sometimes it was easy to forget how old he really was.

“Are you sure it’s only that?” Vision countered, adding to her previous thought of how easy it was to forget his age. He was too insightful for his own good, too thoughtful. Her gaze moved from the stars to his face, but he wasn’t looking at her, his own blue eyes looking vigilantly out the window.

“Natasha was having a nightmare,” Wanda finally admitted. “It woke me up. I couldn’t fall back asleep.”

“You are aware we are due for another attempt at Captain Rogers’ course at 0600 tomorrow morning.” Only then did he look at her. She couldn’t stand to keep his gaze, and instead looked down to the coffee table. “It would be preferable that you sleep. Especially after the events of today.” She realized he was right, per usual. Today had been a particularly rough day. Steve had drilled them ruthlessly, and Natasha was agitated, so sparring with her had been strenuous on both her mind and body. When Wanda didn’t answer, Vision continued. “Your power wanders if it doesn’t have an anchor of some sort. If you’d like, you can use my mind as an anchor. I wouldn’t mind.” After that, he settled into his chair and returned to looking out the window, silent and motionless.

It was several silent minutes when she settled into the couch, pulling the throw from the back to cover herself haphazardly. Only once she got semi-comfortable did she reach out her powers to absorb herself into Vision’s mind. Peaceful skies with skidding clouds and trickling water, soft edges and warmth. Wanda was asleep within minutes.

Wanda might have fallen asleep on the couch, but when the alarm went off at 0530 for her to get up and get ready for the day, she was tucked safely away in her bed, covers drawn to her shoulders. Fuzzy memories of strong arms and lips against her forehead, a mere echo of _Sweet dreams_ weren’t lost to the haze of sleep, or the aggression of the training they faced that day. Steve did compliment them by saying they had almost reached the goal he had set for them, and by the rate they were improving, it would take only a day or two more for them to actually complete it. After the number of times she had to replace her boots because of the mud it better only be one or two times more.

Natasha told her that once they finished Steve’s course in optimal time, they would start being paired off for sparring. And knowing how things typically went, she would be paired with Vision and he would put her flat on her back in a matter of minutes. She might be smaller and quicker, but she could only hold her own against someone as strong as him for a few minutes at most. It was simple battle logic. The weak had to rely on being fast and smart, but no one was smarter than Vision, so even if she was fast, she would be easily subdued. Despite her pessimism, she had managed to pin Natasha into submission repeatedly the past two days, and it didn’t look like her technic was faulty enough for the Black Widow to slip past and counter her. And Natasha even complimented her on how much she had improved in the past month, and that made the rest of day perfect.

Every night she ended up in the lounge looking at the stars after experiencing someone else’s nightmare, Vision would come and keep her company. On the nights when his soft, calming mind wasn’t enough, they would watch movies together, old, black and white movies that she recalled watching as a young child on her parent’s small television on the floor in the living room, then on to old shows like _Little House on the Prairie_ , _Star Trek_ and, sometimes, _Sabrina, the Teenage Witch_. It was a wonderful bonding experience for the both of them over the course of several nights, and Wanda Maximoff felt she had found a friend in the android. During their nights and training sessions together as a team had Wanda tending to stick with Vision even outside of training. They became friends, good friends, in fact, and Vision was always willing to lend a hand when it came to her nightmares.

The ones of losing her brother were always the worst. Dreams that came from her fellow Avengers were easier to deal with because she knew the nightmares weren’t coming from her own subconscious, and with enough effort on her own she could escape them. But dreams formed by herself were always more difficult. She had to accept that they were her own. These nightmares were mostly the same. It would follow the crippling moment her mind lost contact with her brothers and she fell to her knees amongst the chaos, her powers incinerating the foes around her. Other times she would realize her brother was in danger and she would try to find him, but she was never able to reach him in time. She always arrived just as the bullets tore into his body, staining his clothes with blood and her scream never had sound. For those dreams, she’d wake up with that scream halfway out of her throat, clutching her hand to her heart, feeling it pound against her ribcage like it was trying to escape, feeling guilty that it was beating and her brother’s was not.

On those nights, she would push off the covers, draw her knees to her chest and shiver despite the heat coming from the vents. She would remain alone until a soft knocking came from at her door. “Come in,” she said softly, then, after clearing her throat, said it louder. Her door opened slowly and in came a familiar face. “Vision, what are you doing here?” Wanda tried to shake off the aftereffects of her nightmare and try to relax now that she was in his presence.

“You were having a nightmare,” he said calmly, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “About your brother, and Ultron.” Wanda shivered again at the mention of the tyrant and of her brother, and hoped that Vision didn’t notice. It was a baseless hope due to the fact that Vision never missed anything.

He came forward and pulled the covers she had neglected back over her bare legs, which didn’t help with the cold that seemed to be coming from inside her, but the gesture itself warmed her heart just a bit. She could feel the concern for her well-being coming from Vision, a concern she had felt from her brother a hundred times over. The concern was both welcomed but it also made her feel useless and weak. On one hand she wanted to feel cared about, but on the other she didn’t, because it made her feel dependent on someone other than herself.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” he murmured, his voice low out of situational necessity. Though no one else was in the room, and her quarters were farther away from the others, he still spoke as if he would wake someone should he be too loud. She shook her head uselessly, not knowing if he could help. How could she make him understand that she was experiencing a monster that came from within herself, and that’s what made her so afraid? He would think she was a lunatic and unfit to be an Avenger, the only place in the world that would accept her, and she would become the outcast, even here.

Vision put his arm around her tense shoulders, her muscles surprisingly loosening under his touch. “Please remember Wanda,” he said in that same soft voice. “No matter what you’re going through, I am here if you need someone to talk to. No matter the issue, I’ll do my best to help you in every way I can.”

That had her smiling and leaning into Vision’s side, wiping away the remains of her tears. Despite everything, she could fool herself, just for a little while, that things were going to be okay.

“Thank you, Vision,” she said tiredly, closing her eyes and brushing her mind against his. The softness calmed her again and she found herself beginning to fall asleep despite her nightmare.

“Of course, Wanda,” he said, softer than ever, and her semiconscious mind tricked her into feeling lips against her temple.


	3. Chapter 3

Her relationship with anyone aside from her brother had always been business. With HYDRA, with Ultron, with the Avengers. Sometimes, Wanda wondered if it would ever feel like a home to her, and if the people she interacted with on a day to day basis would ever feel like a family. This compound was just that, a compound. Her room was just a room, her bed was just a bed. The kitchen was just a place that had food and the dining room was just a place they ate. It wasn’t home. Everything smelled new, like a hospital and in some places, like a nursing home. The castle in Sokovia had a distinct smell that she found herself missing sometimes. Only sometimes. Here, the new Avengers facility was foreign. Everything was bright and everyone was so accepting.

Now the only smell she found familiar was Vision’s smell. It was clean and warm, like fresh linen hung outside on a summer day. It stirred within her dull memories of her mother bringing laundry in from outside, the smell of it coming with her. On the nights she fell asleep beside him, her mind buried in his own, she woke up with the new hospital smell of her own room. Her pillow smelled only faintly of the shampoo she used, which wasn’t her personal choice, and she didn’t identify with.

Everything was so barren here. Everything was bright, but lacked color, lacked vibrancy. Everything except Vision.

Vision understood her struggles. He didn’t try to tell her everything was going to be okay like everyone else, because he understood that some things couldn’t be made better with those petty words. Like her brother’s death, which haunted her still. He understood her pain, her guilt, and let her work through the pain on her own, though he would remind he was always willing to lend an ear to listen to her grievances. That was something she discovered about Vision. He wouldn’t talk that much if she wanted to complain or cry or yell. He would listen to her, watch her with calm blue eyes and an even calmer mind that would soon ease her worries. Vision saw things so much differently than she did, than any of the Avengers did. He saw the good, the promise in everyone, even Ultron. She saw one of his memories, after the battle in Sokovia when he confronted Ultron, in a torn and ravaged body. While Ultron preached on the doomed human race and their eventual and inevitable damnation, Vision took a very different path, as he inevitably would.

_“But a thing isn’t beautiful because it lasts. It’s a privilege to be among them.”_

It was the most incredibly beautiful thing she had ever heard anyone, especially someone like Vision, say, and Ultron had just found it incredibly naïve. It really was, to believe everyone was inherently good, but it was also something rare to see in someone so vastly intelligent, and a bit refreshing. Vision had told them in the very beginning that he was on the side of life. When Wanda really thought about his last conversation with Ultron, she had to remember that fact. Vision didn’t just stand for life. He stood for giving people a chance at living, at creating their own lives to do with as they choose. He stood for giving people everywhere a chance to live. It was a complete 180 from Ultron’s ideas. He stood for eliminating people before they had a chance to live, to prevent them from making mistakes. But it too mistakes to better a person. Everyone had to fall before they learned to walk, had to hurt before they could learn to heal.

Vision’s experience was limited to being born from war, having the foundation of a machine aiming for genocide. Built atop it was the programming of JARVIS, Tony Stark’s AI, and whatever came from the Infinity Gem imbedded into his forehead, and the experiences of his own. Vision was naïve, but that was probably the best thing for him, and for her. He was so trusting, so open, so calm and so brilliant.

His brilliance was something that would always outweigh her own. Physically, he was also perfect. When she and Vision were paired up to spar together, to work on their techniques, like she knew they would, he barely had to do anything to subdue her, pining her arm behind her back or against the floor with the side of his hand at her throat. He was just able to assess everything and react so much faster, and, good god, was he flexible. It was astonishing to see the ways he could contort himself. It was hard to get his arm pinned behind his back because he would just twist his entire body around to retaliate.

Vision was too good for this world. He was too pure. That was something she noticed on the first day she met him, the _real_ him, outside of the cradle and not suffocating beneath Ultron’s thumb. But to some extent, Wanda had felt it the very first time she noticed his mind. _He’s dreaming._ She had sensed the childish curiosity and wonder and the subtle cringe against the asteroids impact, not as noticeable as the searing pain in her temples that came partially as a reaction to this new creature’s fear.

It was probably stupid of her to do this. No, it _was_ stupid, but she had already gone through the trouble. Vision didn’t own things. The room he had been assigned was bare, and he didn’t sleep, so his bed wasn’t used and he didn’t make a mess. If she hadn’t become accustomed to the calm feel of his mind, the way her power naturally sought it out when she wasn’t paying attention, she would think he was never there. And since he didn’t own anything, she thought it would be nice to have something that was truly his own.

Art was something that came from a person’s heart. It was a visual expression of things they held dear. So she got him a sketchbook. It had seemed a good idea at the time, when she had asked Natasha to get it for her when she went to the Avenger’s tower in New York City. The Black Widow had been more than willing to get it for her, and had brought back a pretty simple one. It was spiral bound, a plain black cover and plenty of blank expansive pages. She’d even threw in some pencils, free of charge. So the sketchbook sat in the top drawer of her nightstand, waiting until she got the courage to give it to him. But Vision would think the gift was stupid, meaningless. An insult to his brilliance.

Sam and Rhodey were in the training room when she went in to take out some of her frustration on the punching bag. Sam had headphones in his ear and was pounding the punching bag with a vengeance, and Rhodey was tightlipped at the bench-press. The tension in the room was more than evident. It was palpable in the air between them. She stood there awkwardly with her bag hung on one shoulder, looking between the two and feeling out of place.

“Did something… happen between you two?” she finally said, and only Rhodey heard her. He sat up from the bench press, taking the towel from the floor and wiping the sweat from his neck.

“No,” he hissed, more harshly than she’d ever heard him talk. “Nothing at all.” Even as he said that, his distress and anger was rubbing off on her, making her skin prickle. Wanda rolled her eyes. Clearly, he was lying. That would be evident to anyone. Even without going to sense Sam’s mind, the same distress and anger was obvious in his body language.

“That’s a lie,” she said easily, dumping her bag by the door. “Before you two were attached at the hip. Now it looks like you can’t stand each other. What happened? Did you get into a ‘who’s got the bigger muscles’ contest and you both lost to Steve? No offense, but even a body builder would lose to him.”

“Ha ha, very funny,” Sam chimed in tonelessly, yanking his headphones from his ears and moving to hold the bag still, before pointing an acidic glare at Rhodey. The bag was still swinging slightly as he pushed past her to leave the training room. Her temple pounded as his shoulder brushed her own. She watched the door swing shut behind him, sighing as the tension dissolved somewhat.

“I am serious, though,” she said, replacing where Sam was at the punching bag. “What’s going on? We’re supposed to be a team. Building communication skills, teamwork. All that stuff that Steve has been beating into us since we first got here.” Rhodey huffed, annoyance dissolving his anger for a while. Wanda supposed she would rather have him be annoyed than angry at his teammate.

“It’s this Groundlock crap,” Rhodey hissed. “I haven’t had War Machine for weeks and Steve hasn’t said shit about when it’ll end! Sam’s sayin’ even if I had my armor I’d still be useless and I’m trying to get him to realize that with his stupid wings he can’t do shit. Sure, he can give us aerial recon but what else? If it weren’t for his wings, he wouldn’t even be here.” Wanda had finished putting on the boxing gloves by the end of his little rant, and she was reminded of a conversation she had with Vision early one morning in the kitchen.

“Without your suits, you think you’re not valuable to the team, is that what you think?” she questioned, and without giving him time to answer, continued. “You’re strong, smart. You’re a pilot, you studied aviation engineering. More than I have done. Tony Stark would be in the same situation as you without his Iron Man suits, and he is still valuable to the Avengers. We all want to belong here, and even without your suit, you have you ingenuity, your intelligence. Your passion to protect people and make yourself stronger. That’s what we all have. That’s part of what makes us Avengers. We want to protect people, and if we can’t, we get stronger until we can. That what the point of Groundlock is. So we can become stronger.” Everything was quiet after she said that, but she felt the anger and annoyance dissipate. She had to remember to thank Vision the next time she saw him. “You should apologize to Sam. Friendship shouldn’t be sacrificed to petty rivalries and fights.” The annoyance didn’t reappear, so she assumed she had said the right thing. Wanda thought about these things often, and she was a very deep thinker, but sometimes she had trouble articulating the things that went through her head.

“You’re right,” Rhodey finally grumbled, getting up to track his teammate down. “Thanks, Wanda,” he added with a smile in her direction.

“You’re welcome,” she responded with a smile of her own, and it was rare for her to do that with anyone but Vision. It definitely seemed like they were making some teambuilding progress. Rhodey nodded before leaving, cold air coming in from the hallway. It was always hot in the training room, which she despised only because that meant she got drenched in sweat when she went there for an hour or two, if she was particularly frustrated.

Later on in the night, she laid in bed, with Natasha gone to the Avengers tower and Sam and Rhodey’s argument behind them, the both of them reaching absolution with the other, so it was easy for her to fall asleep if she wanted to. Something was bothering her, however, and she rolled on her side to point a glare at the nightstand. The sketchbook and pencils still sat in the top drawer, and had been for two days now. It had no doubt collected some dust, even shut away like it was. She nipped at her lip until she finally reached a decision. Huffing a sigh, she chose to leave the warmth of her bed for the cold tile floor of her room, and, after pulling her robe on, took the sketchbook from its prison. She was right, it had collected some dust, but a quick brush solved that problem, and Wanda took the sketchbook and pencils with her as she left her room in favor of the hallway.

Vision was in the lounge again, like he was most nights. He had gotten into a habit of watching the stars on the nights the sky wasn’t clouded over, a habit that Sam told her she had taught him. Wanda refused to think that was a bad thing. The stars had always been beautiful to her, and sharing that beauty with Vision was just something humans did. They wanted to have other people share in that beauty, and Wanda wanted to show Vision the stars, aware that he would have probably developed the habit on his own before too long. As soon as she came in, his blue eyes left the sky and looked to see who had come to join him.

“Shouldn’t you be sleeping?” he asked lightly, nevertheless welcoming her with a smile. He stood from the chair he had come to claim as his – the one nearest to the window – to come stand before her. The sketchbook was held behind her back with cold fingers, until she eventually stepped forward, bringing it into view.

“I wanted to give this to you,” she said, trying to hide the nervousness in her tone and the tremor in her fingers, the subtle shake of her knees. “I thought you might like to draw something sometime. Consider it a late birthday present.” Wanda had said it as coolly as possible, acting like she wasn’t afraid to give him something as meager as this. And there was a problem. He wasn’t taking the book from her hands. Maybe he was trying to find a polite way to tell her that he didn’t want it. _What use would I have for it?_ He’d probably say, and then she’d laugh and come up with some bullshit story about how Natasha had gotten it for her and she didn’t know what to do with it, so she decided to get rid of it and figured Vision would want it. Would that work? She would probably have to find out some way to get rid of it, because seeing it would bring up memories of how stupid she had been, plus, she couldn’t draw worth a damn.

But just as it was starting to get uncomfortable, the book was pulled from her outstretched hands and into Vision’s. “I… thank you, Wanda,” he said, and he sounded like he truly meant it, like he was truly touched by the gesture. She could feel the disbelief, the gratitude, coming from him in waves, and smiled, partially out of relief, but mostly because her idea hadn’t been a stupid one at all.

“You’re welcome, Vizh,” she said after a long moment, patting him on the shoulder so she didn’t stand there awkwardly. Before she could properly assess what was happening, she found herself being hugged. Vision’s arms were much longer than her own, his body taller, bigger. He engulfed her in an all-encompassing embrace that she couldn’t help but sink into. She hadn’t been hugged like this since her brother died, and the memory of his tight hugs picked at the raw wound in her heart.

If she thought about it though, she found that the wound wasn’t bleeding anymore and agony to the touch. It was more like it had been cleaned, like a scraped knee would have been, and bandaged. Not healed, not just yet, and it would definitely scar, but it was well on its way.


	4. Chapter 4

Vision’s new sketchbook didn’t go unnoticed for long. If they weren’t training or working on something around the facility (because Steve, more often than not, had them cleaning something), he had it in his hands, angled where no one could see what he was drawing, scribbling in it constantly. The first time Wanda actually saw him using it, she smiled inwardly, sharing a proud moment with herself. She had no idea what he would be drawing, though, but figured it would be of the sky, of the woods outside the compound. Those were the two things he liked the most. She had no doubt that, should Steve say they could leave the compound boundaries, he would walk through them every night until he found some tree to climb and would be able to sit among the branches and watch the stars from there. On the nights she didn’t have nightmares and she stayed asleep long enough to dream, that was what she dreamt about. Vision in the forest and not just being there, but _being_ there, like he belonged among all of this life that he helped to save, and that he was almost an instrument to destroy. That made her think that maybe he would be drawing animals. Deer, squirrels that sometimes ran along the terrace outside the windows of the lounge, birds who would never stop singing, butterflies that were starting to appear outside.

Whatever it happened to be, she wouldn’t pry. It was her gift to him, he could use it however he wanted, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t curious.

Groundlock was supposed to end in two days or so, but Steve made an executive decision to extend it another month. Apparently, he too had seen the bonding that was slowly developing between the new Avengers team, and felt that, with more time, the bond would be stronger. Wanda had to admit, this Groundlock thing was actually not a completely stupid idea. She had gotten to know Rhodey and Sam, as well as Natasha and Steve, better than she had ever known Strucker during the entirety of the experimentation she and her brother underwent and during her time working for HYDRA. Sam and Rhodey were both hilarious, either apart or together, but when they were together the most chaos tended to ensue.

After Vision stopped showing up to Natasha’s sparring matches, she asked the Black Widow where he was. She wouldn’t dare admit to anyone but herself that she missed his presence and his watchful eye on her technique as she sparred with Natasha. Natasha told her that he wasn’t going to be training with them anymore, because she had taught him all she could. His strength surpassed hers and his technique rivaled hers now. Vision needed someone stronger to train with, so Steve was going to train him himself. Wanda didn’t really know how to feel about that, but knowing that he wouldn’t be back to train with them made her a little sad.

Nevertheless, Vision still never stopped following her around. He would never let her feel lonely. If she did, even if she were just waking up in the middle of the night from a dream, he would appear out of nowhere, knocking at the door or sitting beside her on the couch. Often times, when they would be alone together at night in the lounge, she would notice him looking at her every now and again, though he was trying to be subtle, pencil moving lightly across the page.

“I really do have to thank you for this, Wanda,” he said softly one night, without looking up from the sketchbook. When she opened her eyes from where she was dozing on the couch, wrapped in a throw, she noticed that she had never seen him look so at peace before, and that peace fell like a heavy blanket around her and the room. “I didn’t ever think that this would occupy so much of my time but I do like drawing.”

Wanda smiled, tiredly, pulling the throw further around herself and settled deeper into the couch, knowing she would wake up in her bed tomorrow morning. “You’re welcome, Vizh,” she murmured, her voice slurred with exhaustion. The nickname had come easily, and Vision definitely hadn’t minded, so it stuck, and came as easily as breathing. She began to wonder how many times she had said those three words. Vision thanked her for every miniscule thing she did, and though it wasn’t annoying, she really wished he wouldn’t. Wanda tried to keep her eyes open only so she could watch him draw - it was amazing, the intense focus his entire body seemed to hold over whatever he was drawing – but she couldn’t keep herself awake. She fell asleep nestled into the couch with her throw wrapped around her, the sound of Vision’s pencil against the paper and the softness of his mind lulling her to sleep.

Her dream was unlike any other she’d had before. Dreams of her own that weren’t nightmares were often of Sokovia before HYDRA and after the bombs. Of the children who were much like them, orphaned and alone, with only themselves to rely on, who looked up to her and her brother. They would often play together in the streets, passing a patched up ball back and forth or stealing food from one of the vendors. This dream, however, didn’t even seem to be _her_ dream. It was as if she was watching everything from someone else’s eyes, from a perspective she had never seen. Blurred images of what she thought was Steve, a city seen from new eyes, Ultron, a conversation, sympathy, grief, carrying someone to a bed, kissing them goodnight, pressing lips softly to smooth skin, concern, gratitude, _love-_

She woke up.

It was as if she were shocked awake by some foreign force, like someone had grabbed her and shook her to consciousness. Weak sunlight came through the open curtains of the window, and she wasn’t surprised to see herself in her room, in her own bed. Sighing, Wanda sat up, rubbing the heels of her hand against her eyelids until she saw colors. Rolling her shoulders, she looked down at the end of her bed and saw something aside from her comforter. It was Vision’s sketchbook. She looked at it as if it were a sleeping snake and any small movement would cause it to awaken and bite her. If Vision had left it there last night, somewhere where she could easily see it upon waking, he must have meant for her to see it. Still, she hesitated before reaching forward to take it into her hands. It felt heavier than when she had last held it in her hands two weeks ago, though she knew that it wasn’t possible. Graphite couldn’t make it weigh that much more. Maybe it was because of the fact that it held a different kind of weight, a different importance beyond just bound paper.

Glancing around her room as if she was expecting him to be there watching her, she pulled her pillows up behind her and leaned back into them, pulling the over away from the pages beneath. The first page was the Avengers logo that was on the outside of the building and on the tower in New York. Despite its black and white copy it had a certain realism in it that she found impressive. The next page was filled with what she thought it would be. Rough sketches of graphite filled the page this time of different skylines, different sunrises or sunsets that were beautiful, even without color. The next few pages were of the woods. Leaves and trees of different kinds, careful detail put into the bark and veins. It was when she turned to the next page was when she stared in astonishment. It was Rhodey, drawn with such detail it was almost like she was looking at a picture. Every little bit of it was so delicately drawn. The eyes were so expressive, the subtle quirk of his mouth portraying humor. She could almost see the muscles in his jaw moving as he began to laugh. The next page was the same portrait, this time of Sam. Veiled annoyance covered his features, as though Vision had asked Sam to look at him or stand still long enough for Vision to study his features completely enough to draw him from memory. His dark skin glistened like he had been sweating or in the rain. The next page was Steve, his arms crossed over his broad chest, full lips pursed in concentration, brows furrowed to create a faint line between them. Next was Natasha, short, curled red hair and fierce expression, dark lips pursed much the same way Steve’s had been.

The next drawings, however, were the ones that really left her astonished. It was drawings of her. The first was her, her power flowing from her fingertips. Fierce determination was in her eyes. It was like looking into a mirror, and her fingertips even had to graze over the two-dimensional drawing to make sure it wasn’t real. The next was of sitting on the couch that was only partially drawn in, her posture straight and hair in ringlets. She looked like physical perfection, or like a regal goddess, something she would never see herself as. Another was of her smiling, her entire face glowing from the picture. Her features were carefree and joyful, something that she didn’t feel if she wasn’t with Vision. There were many more just like that, of her drawn in various moods, whether she was smiling or frowning, lost in thought or with her eyes forward, posture slouched or perfect. The meaning of this was easy to read. While Sam, Rhodey, Steve and Natasha were always drawn from the chest or shoulders up, all the drawings of her were different. Some would be full body while some would be of just her face or, in some occasions, just her eyes. And each time they would be drawn with such accuracy she could hardly believe that Vision had done this. It made Wanda realize that Vision thought every part of her was beautiful and worth the time to examine and draw.

The very last picture was of her sleeping on the couch. Her arm was behind her head, her face turned away from the back. She was drawn like an ancient temptress, her lips full, her hair perfect. Every part of her portrayed with careful attention and precision. When she reached out for Vision’s mind, she found that he was with Steve, probably sparring if she had to guess. It was early, but with Steve’s nightmares of ballrooms and a woman, of noticing that someone very important was missing, she wasn’t surprised he was up early. A look at the clock on her nightstand told her that it was nearing 6, so there was no point in settling in the bed again. She was awake now, and she needed to talk to Vision away from everyone else, before their morning run began. After putting the sketchbook on her pillow and throwing her covers over her bed in half-assed attempt at making it, she took a quick shower before getting ready for the day, this time at least trying to tame her curls before leaving her room. Vision was done sparring with Steve by the time she left, and when she passed Steve in the hall she was surprised to see him looking exhausted and sweaty.

Vision was in the dining area when she found him, and he was sitting at the table looking rather bored when she arrived. “Vision,” she called to gain his attention, and his blue eyes made her almost lose her nerve.

“Good morning, Wanda,” he murmured, soothing tenor voice and calming British accent ever-present constants that she found comforting.

“You… your sketchbook,” she began lamely. “You left it in my room. Any… particular reason?”

“I had filled the pages,” Vision responded calmly, sitting up a bit straighter. “I didn’t have any more room, and I knew you were curious as to what I was drawing, so I decided to give it to you once I was done with it. Consider it an early birthday present,” he added with a smug grin, one that had Wanda surging around the table and kissing him. It didn’t last very long, and when she pulled away, standing straight up with that determination that Vision admired so much burning within her. He watched her with a surprisingly calm expression, but beneath his mind was a flood of thoughts, moving so fast that she couldn’t follow them. “Does this mean you liked your gift?” he finally said, to which she responded with breathless laughter before kissing him again.

“Yes, I liked my gift,” she laughed. “Very much.”

 


	5. Chapter 5

Their relationship was an incredibly interesting one, meaning things tended to proceed as they had previously, with a few subtle differences. Vision was particularly fond of holding her hand, spreading her fingers and studying the intricate tendons and veins beneath her skin. It was his new found fascination, but it didn't replace his obsessive study of the sky. Wanda kept the sketchbook beneath her pillow, flipping through the beautiful drawings made by Vision's own hand, still astounded by each one. It was needless to say that he got another, and it was almost equally needless to say that he filled it with drawings of her. Instead of full body drawings or portraits, he would draw her hands, the slender lines of her arms, the curl of her hair that she despised when rainy days turned it into a chaotic mess. On those days, she would constantly try to pat it down, to tame it, and Vision would take her hand and call her beautiful.

Vision was the sweetest person that she had ever met. He understood her more than any of the other Avengers there, and recognized her need for dependency on herself and her own abilities. He wouldn't baby her when it came to training. He believed she could do it, even if she didn't herself, and he made it his moral duty to give her the same belief in her abilities that he had. Nevertheless, he was more than willing to hold her while she slept in order to protect her from the nightmares that might invade her mind because of her rampant powers, nestling her in a cocoon of protection that she was more than willing to indulge in. While she slept, he remained in her room, drawing or watching the stars from her window. Wanda knew he didn't prefer her window over the glass walls of the lounge because directly outside her window were trees that blocked the sky, but he would sacrifice his view in order to be by her side.

In group strategy exercises, when they were trained to rely on one another to watch each others back and work off of their teammates abilities (much like Thor and Steve's shield-hammer power duo), the four of them found they had another powerful duo, in theory. Wanda's ability to make temporal rifts in reality and Vision's intangibility made them the dream team. Their technique labeled them as the unofficial ground team, while Rhodey and Sam, with their suits of course, were the aerial team. The four of them were quickly becoming true teammates, with their weekly movies in the lounge and team exercises, while Groundlock had practically been forgotten.

One thing she noticed about Vision was his acceptance of the fragility of the human race, and his acknowledgment of the immortality of his form. Every time she mentioned anything about her brother to Vision, later on in the evening he would become increasingly subdued. One night when they were alone in the lounge, something that was a regular occurrence for them, he was sitting with his new sketchbook sitting closed in his lap, staring out at the rain that pelted against the windows. When she went to brush her mind against his own, she found an incredible amount of worry and uneasiness within him. It weighed his entire form down.

“Are you okay, Vision?” she asked, her worry at his pensive mood increasing when he didn't look at her, or even acknowledge her question for several moments.

When he finally spoke, it was only a soft, murmured, “I'm fine, Wanda.” That was clearly a lie. She didn't even need to try to realize that. His former silence and current avoidance of her gaze concerned her enough to pursue the conversation.

“Vision.” She repeated his name forcefully, firmly, enough to get him to look at her. Even his eyes portrayed his uneasiness. “Tell me what's wrong. What are you thinking about? I can tell you're worried about something.” Vision didn't hold her gaze for the entirety of her last sentence, looking down at the glass coffee table, his brows knitting, lips pressed into a thin line. He probably didn't want to tell her, whatever it was that was concerning him, but she wasn't going to let him leave the lounge and she wasn't falling asleep until he said something. Finally, Vision sighed, looking up to her before he returned to gazing at the rain against the window.

“Human lives are so... fragile,” he whispered, seemingly speaking solely to himself, a verbalized muse she wasn’t meant to hear. “They die so easily. From sickness, other humans, accidents beyond their control. Old age. Humans don’t live forever, and everything about my existence suggests that I will live until someone rips me apart or, in theory, removes this Gem from my forehead.” He brushes his fingers against said Gem as almost an afterthought, as if to emphasize his statement. “One day, you’ll be gone.” Suddenly, Vision’s worry seemed more justified than she would have originally thought. The fear of being alone was something she had ever since she was young and her parents died, with only her brother to rely on. If she had lost him in those days, she wouldn’t have survived. She would have been so alone and lost. Now, she had Vision, and all the rest of the Avengers. She would be okay as long as she had them, and she knew she would have Vision for the rest of her life. Though, Vision wouldn’t have her for the rest of his. Now she understood.

“Vision…” she began, unable to continue. She didn’t know what she could say. It was inevitable that she would die, hopefully not any time soon (though she dreaded the idea of becoming grey-haired and wrinkled), just as it was inevitable that, one day, the rest of the Avengers would die, even Steve. Clint and his family would grow old and die. “Vision, I won’t lie to you. I know that I’m going to get old, we all are, and we’ll die, sometime far away in the future. But you won’t be alone. I mean, Clint’s kids will grow up, get married, have more kids. And the Avengers will always exist. The world is always going to need to be saved. You’ll always have a place the Avengers for as long as they exist. And Vision-“ Wanda stood up, coming to sit on the arm of the chair he was in. Leaning over, she kissed him on his cheek, reaching to take his hand. “Human life is delicate and short in comparison to everything else in the universe. Compared to the stars, our lives are only a blink of an eye. A strike of lightning. You said it yourself, that a thing isn’t beautiful because it lasts. …I just want you to remember, Vizh, that as long as I’m alive, I will always be by your side. Always.”

His troubled gaze now locked with hers, and she saw that his worry had been replaced with the fear of being left alone. It broke her heart to see that fear in him, but she realized it was a justified fear, however inevitable her death might be. This was another one of those things that was over her head. Wanda accepted her own mortality, had come to terms with the fact that there was no solid guarantee she would wake up tomorrow or live to see her next birthday. And she knew that, when she died, she would be dead and that would be the end of it. Before Pietro died, she’d never given a thought to how painful it was when she was without him. It was easy for the dead. It was only painful for those who continued living.

“I understand you will,” Vision said, keeping her eyes. “All I'm concerned about is what happens when you die? Captain Rogers has lost all of his family and friends because of his old age.” Wanda resisted the urge to laugh (because this _was_ a serious conversation), but she couldn't but imagining the face Steve would have made at that. “Though his situation has its differences from mine, the basis is still the same. He lived while the people he knew aged and died. And he was alone before he became an Avenger, before he met Natasha Romanov and the others. It was fortunate that he had a place ready for him when he awoke, but that might not be the case for me in the future. If the Avengers cease to exist, I won't belong anywhere. I'm afraid of that. I'm afraid of not belonging, I'm afraid of alienation.”

The fear of alienation was something present in all human beings. It was natural, as well as primitive. The only way the human race's existence had continued was because their primordial ancestors stayed with the pack, and the one's who strayed died. The sick and weak, or the ones who did not conform were picked off by predators, and their descendants didn't contribute to the gene pool of the human race. This was conditioned behavior, and threat of alienation creates the paradigm for humans, but it was produced by a shallow society. What Wanda knew of this alienation was very little. She had never read up on those things, because existential philosophy had never peaked her interest. Though she knew that she would never willingly choose to live and exist on her own for the rest of her natural life, and she recognized his fear of alienation as being something completely, utterly human, developed through evolution.

She took his hand, squeezing his fingers tightly. “I know you're afraid,” she whispered. “And I told you I wouldn't lie to you. I don't know what to say. I'm not as smart as you Vision, and I can't have deep conversations like you need in order to... find yourself and secure your future. All I can do is tell you that I will be there – be  _here_ .” She squeezed his finger as tightly as she could, knowing it wouldn't hurt him, not really. “I'll be here with you for as long as I am able to be.”

Vision took her hand and laid it flat, her palm and his pressed against each other, the warmth of her skin and the delicacy of her body once again capturing his attention. “You are beautiful,” he finally whispered, voice so low she barely heard, and had to strain her ears to listen. “Not just for the beauty in your skin, your eyes, your hair. You're beautiful beneath that, the muscle beneath your skin, the tendons, veins, nerves, blood and bone beneath that. Every part of you has been sewn from the greatest art, from the strongest words, and the shortest lived lives from the past. And just as their lives ended, as will yours. I just hope that it will not end any time soon.”

“It won't.”

Wanda's reply was as hopelessly beneficial to him as it was to her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter this time around, so I apologize for that. I think the universe is trying to tell me it's time to get a new computer because today I had everything but the blue screen of death and had to do a complete system reset. Lost all of the progress I made on this chapter and had to start everything over, so a lot of my thought processes went down the drain. My Word application got deleted, so I'm working in a free knock-off version that resembled 2007 Word that I am no longer familiar with how to use. Due to this system reset, it's like I'm handling an entirely different computer, so next chapter may come out late tomorrow, but no promises. Sorry guys!


	6. Chapter 6

Wanda had never given thoughts to her own fears. In some ways, she assumed one of her greatest fears had become reality when she lost her brother. Her power to give people visions of their own fear, like she had subjected many of the Avengers to when she first met them, wouldn't affect her even if she tried, though why she ever would was a mystery. In recent weeks, she had taken to meditating to try and control her powers more absolutely, often sitting in one place for hours on end, working to tame it. She found that her power constantly reached out for a mind to cling onto, and only through concentration and grounding could she get it under control. Upon her request, Vision joined her, his soft mind providing an ample atmosphere for her experimentation in control. With his passive assistance, she was able to made great headway, and now, even without rooting her mind in Vision's, she was able to keep the nightmares that plagued the others no longer harmed her. There was a certain amount of relief that she felt when she slept three nights completely through, nightmare free. Even those that rose from her own subconscious were stamped out by her new control. It was incredibly satisfying that she could rely on herself for this now, and not be constantly dependent on Vision's mind to grant her peaceful sleep.

That didn't mean that she didn't like taking solace in his mind. Despite the months of training and existential talks late at night, h e was still as innocent as a newborn child. Granted he knew more of the world now than he had at the moment of his creation, his belief that human were inherently good seemed to not have changed. He still believed protecting them so they could come to reach their potential highest selves. His appreciation for nature what was she loved the most about him. In the past when they would make their way through the course Steve had set up – something that they had long since grown out of – he would have the mental capacity to enjoy the scenery around him without slowing from his normal pace, and memorized it within seconds. And his fascination with the stars hadn't faded over time, and now he could name constellations she had never even seen before, or knew existed, could name stars light years away that her human eyes didn't have the capacity to see. If she were to describe the beauty of Vision's mind, she would speak of the tallest pines and the deepest greens and blues, the streak of the Milky Way lingering in the indigo sky far above.

The compound was no longer a compound to any of them. It might have been in the beginning, when they called the kitchen the dining hall, and their rooms were known as their quarters, but now, this place had the familiar halls and smells that no longer resembled a hospital. There was a distinct smell of spice in the kitchen, where sometimes Rhodey and Natasha would cook an actual meal, they would push together the tables of the dining hall and sit together, talk, eat, and laugh. There was the perpetual odor of sweat and dirty socks coming from the training room, where hours were spent sparring with one another, bets and dares made between friends. The lounge smelled like popcorn, locked there from their movie nights and the fistfuls that had probably been lost beneath the couch cushions. Wanda's room smelled of candle smoke, as she lit them every day when she meditated or at night while she fell asleep, and Vision would blow them out for her lest they set something on fire. Her bed smelled like the woods and clean air, her pillow of her shampoo. On her nightstand was a clock, its green LED light showing her the time and casting an eerie light across her bed. Under her pillow was Vision's first sketchbook, its pictures well-examined.

Vision had taken to laying beside her at night, so, in her restlessness, she could sprawl herself across his chest or nuzzle her nose against the side of his neck. Vision never minded, in fact, he relished in the chance to hold her and see her so unguarded, plus he enjoyed the smell of her hair and the feel of her skin. It was those delicate things, and those precious moments that he treasured the most.

It was on one of those particular nights, when Wanda had curled against Vision's chest, her hand resting over where his heart would be, and his atop hers, that she had the dream, the most terrifying dream she'd ever experienced in spite of its simplicity and clear meaning.

It began in Sokovia, in the destruction of Ultron's attack. His robots were all around her, coming in waves and she was about to overwhelmed they were coming in such massive force. It was so real, so vivid, that it didn't come close how a dream would feel. The soreness in her muscles and the ache in her teeth was there, the hesitating connection with her brother's mind, her own not used to having it be there. It was no matter if her power ripped one apart, two more where there to take its place, just like a hydra. Fear had choked down whatever call for help she may have produced. Before she was swallowed beneath their mechanical hands, an angel descended from the sky, hands ripping and tearing apart the enemy before he reached her, taking her into his arms and beating his wings to deliver her to salvation. Looking up, she met blue eyes that gazed down at her with such adoration and concern that she smiled to alleviate that worry. Her hand lifted, seemingly of its own accord, tingling numbness from adrenaline still lingering in her fingertips, her palm resting against the synthetic skin of his cheek that was as real to her as her own. They hovered there, above the chaos and devastation, above it all, and she would have kissed him then and there, stifling his question about her well-being.

She would have, but, in the next moment, the world was rocked violently, like a sudden earthquake, and they were thrown from their place of holiness to the sin of the earth. Grit stung the scrapes now adorning her arms and palms, her head whipping as she searched through the debris for any hint of her angel.

“Wanda,” she heard beyond her, far off, and turned to meet blue eyes once again. Relief spread through her, though she really had no need to worry. Vision was strong, Vision was her rock, her support, her love. He smiled at her from across the destruction, a light in the darkness among the chaos around them, the gem gleaming almost proudly on his forehead.

A flash of blue and gold and a crippling emptiness caused her to collapse to the floor. It wasn't her brother, not this time. She looked to the angel in front of her, memorizing the details of his face in no time at all. His blue eyes were still locked on her own, but they were empty, no feeling, no _ life _ within them at all. Laughter, deep and throaty. The gem was gone from his forehead, the space where it once resided now hollow of its host. Vision's body, once standing so tall and proud, crumpled to the ground, and she could only watch as it faded to ash.

Wanda woke screaming, shooting upright in her bed, heart ready to burst from her chest. She was faintly aware of someone beside her, fingertips brushing her shoulder, and she recoiled away from it. Her power flared at her fingers, taking her attacker and slamming it against the far wall, feet flat against the cold floor and teeth grit, hand clenched and ready to suffocate whatever adversary she was facing. It took her a long moment to realize that, the person she had crushed against the wall with enough force to break bone and an invisible grip against their throat, was Vision. Realization overtook her, as well as bone crushing guilt, and her powers ripped away from Vision and snapped back into her own body. Vision collapsed to the floor, dropping to one knee, before he was almost immediately at her side, his hands caressing her shoulders. She finally became aware that he was calling her name and that she had fallen to both her knees. “Wanda?” Vision was saying, his voice heavy with worry and breaking. “Wanda!” She was unable to respond, her voice stuck in her throat buried beneath the tears that burned at her eyes, so she pressed herself against him, his arms drawing her in tightly. His fingers stroked through her hair and he whispered something soothing that she couldn't make out with a soft voice. 

He held her for most of the night, until birds began chirping outside and the moon had set, the sky lighting subtly. Her tears had long since abated, her exhausted body limp in his arms, and he eventually drew her back to the bed, pulling the strewn covers over her shivering form. 

Finally, he spoke. “Wanda?” he murmured, but she didn't open her eyes. Her eyelids felt like they were being weighed down with lead. “What happened? Will you tell me?” He sounded so genuinely concerned for her. After all the times he came to her when he was troubled about something, he would tell her about it bluntly, so she took a breath, swallowing to try and dislodge the lump in her throat, and spoke against his chest.

“We were in Sokovia,” she finally admitted. “We were fighting against Ultron's army, and you saved me from his robots, but... someone took your Gem. You... you died, turned to ash.” Her voice broke at that last word, and she would have started crying if she had tears to spare. Vision brushed his hand through her hair once more, but was otherwise silent, and she didn't know whether or not that was a good or bad thing. Wanda was incredibly surprised when he drew her face up and kissed her, hard and deep. It was full of promises and worry and worthless words that would never be said. It was very rare that Vision would kiss her like this, with such abandon and emotion behind it, and it left her breathless every time.

“I'm sorry,” was all he said, voice tight, and she decided to leave it at that. 

They both knew the future was less than guaranteed for them. Wanda now understood why it was hard for her to imagine herself as an old woman, with grey hair and wrinkled skin, and it was because she didn't think she  _ would  _ l ive that long. Her brother must have certainly thought that he was invincible with his speed and metabolism, and she saw where that lead him. He didn't play folly with his life, of course, but when people are young, they never think they'll die. 

The day progressed so slowly for both of them. Wanda and Vision didn't speak to one another, but they didn't let go of each others hand when they were together. It was something silently agreed upon, but it wasn't through anger or frustration. It was just because they didn't know what to say to soothe each others doubts. Rhodey commented, “You and Vision, huh?” when he saw them together, and Wanda merely smiled at him, weakly, but said nothing to confirm nor deny it. She knew, in under an hour, Sam would have heard and Steve and Natasha would have caught on as well. Whether or not they were gossiping on both of their subdued behavior wasn't clear, but Wanda had no doubt they would eventually notice it. 

That night, Wanda stayed curled against Vision's chest, his hand clasped over hers, but she didn't sleep, and he didn't speak. When Wanda thought over the events of the night before, of her nightmare and the blue and gold flash before Vision's gem was stolen. Because that's what really happened. Whatever or whoever was hidden in that blue-gold blur had taken it for himself. It was while she was wondering what could have been the trigger for such a nightmare when a crippling realization crossed her mind. She hadn't pulled her power within herself to prevent it from roaming and giving her a nightmare from one of the other Avengers within the compound. No, she had buried herself in the former peace of Vision's mind like she so often had, searching for the trees and the stars as she fell asleep.

Her nightmare, where Vision had lost his gem and died, turning to ash, hadn't come from her. It had been spawned from Vision's fear that the gem would be stolen and that would result in his death. Closing her eyes to the sight of their hands on his chest, she pulled her powers up and out to brush against his mind, alarmed at how the softness was minutely harder, the warmth and brightness now cooler and dimming. It felt so achingly familiar to someone who was witnessing a vision of their greatest fear that she swallowed, drawing her power away and within herself once more. 

Whatever inevitable end they faced – whether it be a future together or apart through varying circumstances – Wanda had an aching worry that she might not be the one to die first.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My tumblr - http://danse-macrabe.tumblr.com/


	7. Chapter 7

When Vision was first born, the first thing he saw was a man with golden hair and a red cape. Something within him burned, his limbs moving of his own accord, and he launched himself at this man, this stranger, with the intent to harm him. It was incredibly disorientating, this initial urge to hurt, to kill. The world was a blur of bright lights and indistinguishable shadows that were rapidly coming into concentration, and he was just able to see the glass before he was sent through it. There was a burning hatred within him, the need for destruction, the programming for world protection gone wrong, _what are you doing?_ , a glowing orange program just ahead. And then that burning was gone, and he was left with a chilling clarity, protection and creation combating whatever came before. The lights, buildings and dark sky beyond, as well as the phantom reflection of himself... He was not what he expected. There was no red, no metal, only blue eyes and synthetic skin.

It would take him a long while to discover the true reasoning behind this initial moral conflict. It was after he learned that Ultron had initially created his body to house himself, a newer upgrade or the next stage in his evolution to his ultimate form. In order to prevent Ultron from reaching this higher form, the Avengers had captured the Cradle his body was originally housed in – something he destroyed upon his birth – and downloaded someone whom he never had the opportunity to meet, an AI called JARVIS, into his body. They were conflicting programs, one hellbent on destruction and the other on protection, and this was the cause.

He hadn't been lying, however, when he said he was neither Ultron nor JARVIS. He had the programming there for both in the beginning, the desires, he was presented with them, and he was left to make a decision as to which he would agree with, which he would follow. Two conflicting motives, and he made his choice.

The Avengers didn't trust him, not in the beginning, but he was all too aware that the world, that the life that thrived upon its surface was in danger. Though he hadn't yet met Ultron, he knew him, knew his ambitions, his goals. It was all in him, all the memories of violence and control at Ultron's hands. The Avengers had no time to waste. They had to stop Ultron before his ambitions became reality.

And he had been close. Oh so close. If it hadn't been for last-minute calculations and contributions from what was left of SHEILD, thousands of lives would have been lost. Wanda Maximoff – the Scarlet Witch – her brother had been lost to Ultron's army, his life sacrificed to save another.

Vision's earliest memory was of Ultron's dream. Of global annihilation from a meteor, the planet being scorched and drowned beneath an ocean of blood. No one survived, no human, no animal, no insect. Nothing but Ultron and his absolute rule over the devastated world. While he was being subjected to this dream, witnessing it as merely a spectator, he found something, or rather, something found him. A bright red presence, searching for whatever was there, searching for him. He watched as it came closer, saw a woman with fire in her eyes and a man with lightning in his breath. Everything in him wanted to welcome her to wherever this was, but she took one look at the dream, _Ultron's_ dream, and recoiled, pulling her red warmth and brightness away from his cold darkness.

So when he realized this woman was still trapped in the falling ruins of Sokovia, he went purposefully searching for her, seeking out her light and warmth once more, and when he found her, he saved her, delivering her safely to the boats. Delivering her to the body of her brother. Her grief was palpable in their air, her choked sobs the only sounds as the boat returned to the helicarrier.

A funeral was held for her brother, one that no one but herself was allowed to attend. She refused to let anyone else be there, but Vision watched as she grieved from a distance, screaming her sorrow into the sky as rain began to fall. He wished desperately to comfort her in some way, and searched for some way to do so, but he knew that saying it would be okay would not be appropriate. He could not guarantee this, knew this for fact. She had lost her brother – the man with lightning in his breath, Quicksilver, Pietro – and an emptiness had burrowed itself into her heart, or, as she had said, it had been ripped out.

During their training at the new Avengers compound in upstate New York, away from the buildings and lights and dark indigo skies, Vision watched Wanda carefully. She was not a fragile flower in a storm, she was the storm, her power chaos controlled with care. Grief only gave her rage, gave her power, power she had to learn to control all over again. Her body had to be trained, her muscles strengthened. She had to be taught to fight in close quarters hand-to-hand combat, she meditated to control her powers. Her storm was tamed, carefully so, but it was stronger than ever before, and she would unleash it at the prompt of an enemy or a challenge. Physically, she was smaller than the rest of them, yes, but she was no less strong. Her power did not rely on brute force or aerial combat maneuvers, it relied on psychological strength and what many would call 'mind games'.

Vision was no less impressed with her power, her abilities, and he was no less fascinated with everything about her. She was strong, but she wasn't unbreakable. He knew that she would be angry if he protected her at every turn and with every new threat, but he couldn't help but want to protect her. When he was born, he knew he wanted to protect life, and he wanted to protect her life more than all the others.

Vision loved her, as much as he could love anything in the world, and he was more than willing to sacrifice everything he was to keep her safe. He understood that one day, they would die. Whether together, or apart, their end was inevitable. When he thought of himself dying before she did, he could only hope that he died protecting her, a hopelessly heroic vision that he couldn't help but see. Ever since he saw _Titanic –_ another of their movie-night picks that neither he or Wanda had a say in – and witnessed Jack's sacrifice to save Rose, his true love, he found his vision of death was not just a hopelessly heroic one, but also hopelessly romantic.

He understood what the Infinity Gem was. He knew that it wasn't a power of earth, of this infinitesimal world, but a power beyond that, a power that was from a place extensive in comparison. Vision had no doubt that someone out there, some power hungry individual or organization, would crave their power, and would do what they had to in order to gain it.

And months after he came to this conclusion, Thor Odinson, the man he attacked in the beginning and who had been instrumental in his birth, told him much the same. The Infinity Gems were objects of extreme power, and when they were all collected, their owner could destroy the entire galaxy if it were their choice. Thor told him that one of the reasons he entrusted the Mind Gem to him was because his Hammer had considered him worthy, and Thor had no reason to distrust him or his abilities, not yet. He also had no doubt someone would come looking for them, and that was one of the reasons he would have to return to Asgard, because an Infinity Gem was housed there, within the depths of the castle. After the incident with his brother and the Tesseract, Thor was not willing to leave the balance of such powerful items in someone else's hands.

This only worried him more, and now, when he thought of whatever future he might have, he found a future where he was running or fighting for his life as well as the safety of the universe, with Wanda not at his side.

When she had a nightmare of this fear of his, he knew that he had to keep his worries buried deeper than he ever had before. He wished he could tell her something reassuring about their future, but he couldn't. He was beginning to doubt his previous self-reassurances, and, despite all the training, the sparring sessions and combat strategy, he had no confidence in himself or his abilities, not like Wanda or any of the others had. Furthermore, he knew that, should some powerful individual rise up and try to collect the Infinity Gems, he would most likely be locked away somewhere and the rest of the Avengers would risk their lives to keep him, and the Gem, safe. This meant that they would fight, they would get hurt, and they quite possibly would die.

And now, as he held Wanda in his arms, with her sleeping so peacefully against him, listening to her breathing, listening to her heart beating within her, he knew he couldn't allow that to happen. Whatever would happen, whether someone would come or someone wouldn't, Vision would never allow anyone to risk their lives for his own.

Never.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a short, Vision-centric chapter with his thoughts of previous events before the grand finale. You may see where this is leading up to, and if you saw the Age of Ultron movie (which I'm assuming you have) than you know about Thanos and his new escapade to get the Infinity Gems. (I know in the Marvel Cinematic Universe they're called Infinity Stones but I've read the comics for too long to break the habit of writing/saying gems. I'm sorry.) The next chapter will be the last, but it will be written as two alternate endings with my two different visions of how Avengers: Infinity War will play out. Both of them will be pretty short, seeing as I don't have very many details of the movie, only my fan-assumptions gathered from comic books and movie titles. One will be very depressing (probably) and the other won't be (probably). I'll work to get them both up at the same time so you can read them sequentially. Thanks guys.
> 
> My tumblr - http://danse-macrabe.tumblr.com/


	8. The Bad Ending

Fear only existed in the thoughts of the future. That was all anyone had to be afraid of, really. The future events they could not foresee and therefore, could not prevent, change, or truly prepare for. If you knew, in your future, there existed a life or death struggle which, for the Avengers, always seemed inevitable, you could train and prepare yourself that way, but when the battle eventually came, you may doubt that your strength and your training would be enough to save what you were fighting so hard to protect.

When Thor told them of Thanos and his quest for the Infinity Gems, Vision felt he had been assigned to death. The Gem in his forehead – its infinite power keeping him alive – felt heavy for the first time since his birth. It wasn't a physical weight, it was purely a weight of importance. He understood what would happen now. The Avengers would fight Thanos, some of them would probably die, and he would be under their protection. He wouldn't be allowed anywhere near Thanos. He might stay locked away in some bunker or in the Avengers tower which was under 24 hour surveillance by one of the greatest security systems in the world.

He was all to aware of Wanda and her presence at her side, and for the first time, her irrefutable light seemed like it had been extinguished and the world was cold and empty. He didn't speak when Steve asked him, “You do know what this implies, right Vision?” nor when Wanda squeezed his hand and said his name. His greatest fear was nearing actuality, the future he was so afraid of about to occur. For the first time since the few moments after his birth, he was angry and felt such a burning hatred towards no one in particular and this frightened him. It was so similar to the burning red chaos that he equated to Ultron's presence, long since extinguished.

Thanos was coming to retrieve the Infinity Gems, and he had already obtained two of the powerful gems, ever since his raid on Asgard and the Collector's Museum. The Space Gem and Reality Gem were all in his possession, and Asgard and its armies were in ruins. The Gems aside from the Mind Gem and the Power Gem had not been found, their locations were unknown, even to Thor, so Vision had no doubt his Gem was the next on Thanos's list.

Once Wanda came to this conclusion herself, after she had examined all the evidence, she looked hesitantly up at Vision, her power brushing his mind before it recoiled at the speed of lightning. There was such anger there, such hatred, and it reminded her, too, of the state of Ultron's ambitions that wanted to vomit. Vision's once soft, warm mind was now cold and hard, full of anger and questions and doubts. Despair of her own crippled her heart, froze her and pulled her into apathy. Vision's innocence had been ruined by this fear unnecessarily. She let go of his hand.

Because of Thanos, Asgard had fallen in an event similar to the apocalypse. After Thanos's first, unsuccessful attack, the Avengers compound, the place they called home, lay in ruins. It was only after a massive, collective effort that they were able to force Thanos back, but not without the loss of the compound. Wanda went through the ruins, beneath unstable beams and rubble threatening to fall to what was left of the room that used to be hers, searching through whatever remained to find the sketchbook Vision had given to her. The edges of its pages were burnt, black eating towards the images on the paper, the cover scraped and covered in dust. The subtle smell of candles still existed, or that may have just been the smoke from the fire that had eaten away at much of the compound.

Thanos's second attack proved to be more devastating than the last. The Avengers tower had been crippled, thousands of innocent civilians had died in the crossfire, and much of New York City lay in ruins. The media was divided down the middle. The ones who knew that Thanos and his army were not of this world called upon the Avengers to protect them, and the ones who denied this fact said the Avengers should give him whatever he was after, though they didn't know that wouldn't solve the problem. In fact, it would make it worse.

The only place they had left to take refuge was the SHEILD helicarrier, and they tried to stay hidden within heavy blankets of clouds. They had all taken serious hits from Thanos and his army. Thor had lost Asgard, and Wanda knew that his greatest fear had come true. Natasha and Clint had nearly died, Bruce had returned in New York but had disappeared once the battle was over, and no one knew if he was alive or dead. Steve's shield had been broken, much like his spirit, Tony had lost his suit, his company was in shambles and his panic attacks were coming more frequently. Wanda had lost Vision, and Vision had lost himself.

Whatever hope they were clinging onto died only few days after they hid among the clouds, when Thanos fought his way through them, made his way deep down within the ship, to where Vision was. Wanda tried, she really did. Even when her arm was thrown from its socket and blood poured from her broken nose, her eye swollen shut and bloody coughs wracking her body, she still tried to stop Thanos until Thor or Steve recovered from his attack and got there. But whatever she did, the outcome was inevitable. Thanos knocked her aside, the two Gems he had keeping her power from affecting him, and pushed down the steel door like it was nothing.

She tried to call for Vision, tried to feel for his mind but her powers were brittle and out of her own control. She was barely aware of golden flashes of light, a battle that tore through much of the helicarrier, before it happened again.

Alone. A broken connection. Her crippled power reached for what had been, but it was no longer there. There was no softness or hardness, no warmth or cold. There was nothing. She screamed, pulling herself from her position on the floor, tearing her way through the destruction, images playing through her mind of an angel, of a smile, _Wanda_ , of ash – 

Her shoulder burned like the sun, like a ravaging fire, her nose hadn't stopped bleeding and she could only see through one eye, but that didn't stop her from pulling Vision into her arms, her arm protesting as she gripped him tightly, wailing into his chest. His body was broken, skin torn much like her own, vibranium bones snapped within him. Blue eyes were closed, and no matter how hard she squeezed his hand, he wouldn't squeeze back.

In the end, they were able to defeat Thanos. After he obtained the Mind Gem he was able to find the Time Gem, one that allowed him to move himself through time and space. They were caught with him, and thrown into the future where the Nova Corps and some new, powerful allies helped them defeat the maniac mad with power. The Gems, however, weren't recovered. The five that Thanos had collected were scattered throughout the galaxy, the Mind Gem lost among the stars. 

They all stayed at Tony Stark's new home with Pepper Potts, a fiery strawberry-blond that Wanda couldn't stand. There was a funeral, but Wanda didn't go. She stayed locked away in her room, two sketchbooks clutched against her chest, and she cried.

Vision was three years old.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the bad ending. In this ending, I went with the idea that Thanos did get Vision's Mind Gem at the end of Infinity War: Part I, which will be released in May of 2018 (which would make Vision about three years old, physically), and Thanos gets the Time Gem in order to travel to the time of Peter Quill and the rest of the Guardians of the Galaxy team, as well as the Nova Corps, and they team up to defeat Thanos. Wanda loses Vision, and the Avengers team is crippled and nearly destroyed. Next chapter is the good ending.


	9. The Good Ending

Fear only existed in the thoughts of the future. That was all anyone had to be afraid of, really. The future events they could not foresee and therefore, could not prevent, change, or truly prepare for. If you knew, in your future, there existed a life or death struggle which, for the Avengers, always seemed inevitable, you could train and prepare yourself that way, but when the battle eventually came, you may doubt that your strength and your training would be enough to save what you were fighting so hard to protect.

When Thor told them of Thanos and his quest for the Infinity Gems, Vision felt he had been assigned to death. The Gem in his forehead – its infinite power keeping him alive – felt heavy for the first time since his birth. It wasn't a physical weight, it was purely a weight of importance. He understood what would happen now. The Avengers would fight Thanos, some of them would probably die, and he would be under their protection. He wouldn't be allowed anywhere near Thanos. He might stay locked away in some bunker or in the Avengers tower which was under 24 hour surveillance by one of the greatest security systems in the world.

He was all to aware of Wanda and her presence at her side, and for the first time, her irrefutable light seemed like it had been extinguished and the world was cold and empty. He didn't speak when Steve asked him, “You do know what this implies, right Vision?” nor when Wanda squeezed his hand and said his name. His greatest fear was nearing actuality, the future he was so afraid of about to occur. For the first time since the few moments after his birth, he was angry and felt such a burning hatred towards no one in particular and this frightened him. It was so similar to the burning red chaos that he equated to Ultron's presence, long since extinguished.

Thanos was coming to retrieve the Infinity Gems, and he had already obtained two of the powerful gems, ever since his raid on Asgard and the Collector's Museum. The Space Gem and Reality Gem were all in his possession, and Asgard and its armies were in ruins. The Gems aside from the Mind Gem and the Power Gem had not been found, their locations were unknown, even to Thor, so Vision had no doubt his Gem was the next on Thanos's list.

Once Wanda came to this conclusion herself, after she had examined all the evidence, she looked hesitantly up at Vision, her power brushing his mind before it recoiled at the speed of lightning. There was such anger there, such hatred, and it reminded her, too, of the state of Ultron's ambitions that wanted to vomit. Vision's once soft, warm mind was now cold and hard, full of anger and questions and doubts. Despair of her own crippled her heart, froze her and pulled her into apathy. Vision's innocence had been ruined by this fear unnecessarily. She let go of his hand.

Because of Thanos, Asgard had fallen in an event similar to the apocalypse. After Thanos's first, unsuccessful attack, the Avengers compound, the place they called home, lay in ruins. It was only after a massive, collective effort that they were able to force Thanos back, but not without the loss of the compound. Wanda went through the ruins, beneath unstable beams and rubble threatening to fall to what was left of the room that used to be hers, searching through whatever remained to find the sketchbook Vision had given to her. The edges of its pages were burnt, black eating towards the images on the paper, the cover scraped and covered in dust. The subtle smell of candles still existed, or that may have just been the smoke from the fire that had eaten away at much of the compound.

Thanos's second attack proved to be more devastating than the last. The Avengers tower had been crippled, thousands of innocent civilians had died in the crossfire, and much of New York City lay in ruins. The media was divided down the middle. The ones who knew that Thanos and his army were not of this world called upon the Avengers to protect them, and the ones who denied this fact said the Avengers should give him whatever he was after, though they didn't know that wouldn't solve the problem. In fact, it would make it worse.

The only place they had left to take refuge was the SHEILD helicarrier, and they tried to stay hidden within heavy blankets of clouds. They had all taken serious hits from Thanos and his army. Thor had lost Asgard, and Wanda knew that his greatest fear had come true. Natasha and Clint had nearly died, Bruce had returned in New York but had disappeared once the battle was over, and no one knew if he was alive or dead. Steve's shield had been broken, much like his spirit, Tony had lost his suit, his company was in shambles and his panic attacks were coming more frequently. Wanda had lost Vision, and Vision had lost himself.

They were all barely clinging on to whatever hope they had left, their attack strategy and teamwork put to the ultimate test when Thanos found them once more. He tore his way through the ship, tossing the already battle-weary and wounded Avengers around like dolls. Wanda was the near last to face him, and her body certainly suffered the consequences for her determination. Her left arm was pulled from its socket, her nose was broken and blood poured from her nostrils, a cut just above her right eye had caused it to swell to the point where she couldn't see, and, after suffering a powerful punch to the stomach, every now and again she would cough up blood.

She would have died, Thanos had been so close to killing her, but in the moment just before her inevitable demise, golden light filled the room and she was just able to see Vision attack Thanos before her world faded away. She was thrown into endless nightmares of screaming children and ash and rubble, _I'm sorry_ and calls of her name. When she finally realized those calls of her name weren't within her nightmares, she managed to pull her eyes open, wincing at the pain in her arm and head. Her first worry was Vision, but when she tried to sit up, she was pressed gently back against the pillows and a hand took hers.

“I'm here, love,” came a soft voice, and her brittle, battered power stretched a weak tendril to brush against a mind that was full of worry and hope and promises that meant nothing and everything at the same time. Vision's other hand brushed the hair from her forehead and he placed a gentle kiss there, and she fell into a dreamless sleep with the weight of his hand in hers.

Once the Avengers had recovered, they had to come to a decision. Their team could have very well been killed, their resistance against Thanos crushed, had it not been for Vision and his power. Thor maintained that one gem against two were not good odds, and Steve made the careful point that a Gem alone was just a gem, but with someone who could harness that power and use it to their advantage as well as Vision could might possibly have a chance against Thanos. Thor agreed to this assumption, but he was afraid that, should Thanos gain a third, this may not be so. The decision they had to make was whether or not they would let Vision battle against Thanos alongside them, or if he should be hidden away and protected by the rest of the Avengers. This lead to a heated argument amongst them, their team nearly split down the middle once more. Rhodey, Sam, Wanda, Natasha Steve and Thor all had confidence in Vision and his abilities, as well as his handling the Gem had to offer him, Tony felt that protecting the Gem from Thanos was more important than how Vision could help them in a fight, and Clint was borderline on both sides. On one hand, he knew the devastating consequences if Thanos should get his hands on the Gem, for the universe and for Vision, but on the other, he did trust Vision's abilities, hell, he'd watched Vision hand Thanos his ass on a silver platter, sending him flying out the side of the helicarrier like it was no ones business.

So they reached the agreement that Vision would fight with them, a decision that liberated Vision from the worry that anyone would sacrifice their lives in order to protect him. That Wanda wouldn't die to protect him, like she so nearly had. The days after Thanos's attack in which she was unconscious and confined to a bed in the medical bay were the most stressful in his three years of life. This meant that he could protect her, to the very end of his means.

The only way Thanos could reach the last known gem would be by traveling through time itself. The Time Gem – whose whereabouts were largely unknown – was the only gem that would allow this. If Thanos had the Mind Gem, he could possibly find the Time Gem, and then there would be no stopping him.

In their next clash, it was an all out battle, a struggle for the live in the entire universe. The severity of this battle weighed heavily on all of their shoulders, and gave them additional strength. People they had never met, and who would never hear of their names, were depending on them to win this battle, so that was just what they would do. Thanos was powerful, that was undeniable, but he bled just like any other man, so he would die like one.

On the day that Thanos fell, Thor had to decide what had to be done with the three Infinity Gems they now had in their possession. After the fall of Asgard and the destruction of the Collector's Museum, Thor felt that the Gems would not be safe anywhere, and decided to scatter them among the stars where no one, not even Heimdall himself would be able to find them. The Infinity and Soul Gems remained lost, and the three other Gems joined them in the infinite reaches of the galaxy. As for the Mind Gem, Thor still maintained that true safety was hard to come by, and entrusted it to Vision once more.

Despite everything they had lost, they found someway to move on. Tony found some of his fathers old notes on the origin of Steve's shield and, with some extreme temperatures, molds and a paint job, it was back, brand new. Natasha and Clint recovered from their injuries, and Natasha disappeared to try and find Bruce while Clint returned to his wife and three children. Tony Stark's company was still in shambles and his suit had been destroyed, but he, in his very Tony-like way, played it off. “Pepper'll deal with it,” he quipped, and, as for his suit, he figured, if he really needed to, he could build another one.

Wanda and Vision's relationship had almost been crippled under Thanos and the threat of his power, but despite this, once the darkness had past, it became brighter and stronger than ever. Wanda was pleased to discover that Vision's mind had returned to its past softness and warmth, and he smiled easily at her, but at night when he held her while she slept, he held her as if she was about to taken from him, or vice versa.

Today they celebrated Vision's fourth birthday, with a cake and party hats, streamers and banners and balloons, and they all ate until they were so full they could hardly move and laughed until they were hoarse.

All was well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, we have finally reached the very end, and this is the good ending. In the both endings, I went after the idea that the Avengers compound and tower would have probably both been destroyed or at least mostly destroyed due to the fact that the MCU likes destruction, and that they took to hanging in the helicarrier from the end of the AOU movie. In this ending, I went with the idea that Vision would be a total beast and help the Avengers defeat Thanos once and for all. Wanda doesn't lose Vision and he regains his original mindset, and they celebrate his fourth birthday, since at the end of Part II, he would be about that age.
> 
> I have to thank everyone who read, kudoed, commented or bookmarked this. You're the motivation behind my writing and the need to give you guys an alternate ending (instead of just leaving the ending sad like I would normally). Thanks guys.
> 
> My tumblr - http://danse-macrabe.tumblr.com/


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